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Dark Lords of the Sith Wiki:Manual of Style
The Dark Lords of the Sith wiki has a Manual of Style that all articles are required to follow. This official policy acts as a guide to ensure that all articles are uniform with certain encyclopedic standards. Some aspects of the policy are optional, but most of it is required unless otherwise noted. Layout guide :Main article: Layout Guide In-universe All in-universe articles should be structured as follows: #Title/eras/infobox #Introduction #Stub #Main article #Behind the scenes #Appearances #Sources #Succession box #Notes and references #See also #External links #Categories It should be noted that not all articles use every section, nor are they required to use every section if the information is not available. For example, if an article does not have any sources, it does not need a "Sources" section or a "Notes and references" section. For more detailed information, please consult the Layout Guide. List of “Appearances” The list of appearances refers to appearances by characters, organizations, and the like in works such as fan fiction, fan films, fan photonovels, and other applicable fan works. is to be used for these lists under the “Appearances” heading. For a list of characters, users have two choices for how to list them; if the author provides and/or wishes to use an official “Dramatis personae," meaning a list of the main/central characters in the work, they may do so along with the list of all other characters. If a “Dramatis personae” is not provided, all characters should be placed under the character heading. In either option, all characters must be listed alphabetically by their last name. If the character does not have a known last name, use their known name to determine where they should be placed on the list. "Dramatis personae" may also be separated into subsections. For example, separated the dramatis personae into Rogue Pilots, Wraith Pilots, New Republic, Empire, and Other. All other non-character appearance sections should have their content alphabetized by the first letter (or subsequent letters if multiple items have the same first letters) of the first word of the item being listed. For additional subsections such as "Languages," use bold-formatted headers under |miscellanea=. See the usage notes on Template:App for more information. Appearances Naming conventions Titles of articles must be in singular form, not plural. For example, an article about droids would not be titled “Droids,” but rather Droid. Names of characters are also not to include titles/ranks. This includes all titles such as military ranks or titles of nobility, all of which must be omitted. For example, an article would be titled Kni'Valus, not "Sith Lord Kni'Valus." Darth is the only exception, and it will not be omitted from Sith Lord names. Character article titles should only have the full name of the person. Later names are to be used instead of earlier names, such as Darth Transel rather than Kahn Dantus. For articles such as droid lines or system names, unless the name contains (or is) a proper noun, none of the words should be capitalized. For example, "Corellian system" would be used instead of "Corellian System" (the same applies for sector names), and B-1 battle droid would be used as opposed to "B-1 Battle Droid." The best way to know whether or not an article's title should be capitalized is to look up whether or not the words in the title are proper nouns. If they are not, then there should not be capitalization. If an article does not have a known name, either because the author does not wish to create a name or a name has not been provided in source material such as fan fiction, "unidentified" should be used in the title with no category piping. For example, Unidentified Sith Lord would be the title of the unidentified Sith Lord. The category would be Category:Sith, and the lack of piping means that, by default, it is categorized under "U" in the “Sith” category. The name of an article should also be in bold in its first usage in an introduction, as should any alternate names or given nicknames. These bold titles should not have links within them. For more information about this and all of the above, please see the Star Wars Fanon wiki's naming conventions. Linking to Wookieepedia When linking to Wookieepedia, please use one of our in-wiki templates to generate links instead of pasting URLs into articles. The two templates are Article name and , both of which work the same way. More information can be found in each template's usage instructions. Proper use of # Do not use the # symbol in a link unless you intend to direct to a section of that article with the title after the # as a section. When linking to articles, particular books, and guides with numbers denoting their order, omit the # and simply put the number. Otherwise the wiki's software will look for that number as a section title on the page. To use a canon example, link to instead of , as the latter will produce an incorrect link. You can use piped links to account for this. For example, ''Star Wars Adventure Journal'' #4 would give you ''Star Wars Adventure Journal'' #4. Perspective and tense In-universe "In-universe" applies to material belonging to the Star Wars universe as opposed to the real world. For example, a character in a fan film is in-universe, as it is part of the story of Star Wars, but the actor who plays said character is out-of-universe. Some out-of-universe terms are also inappropriate in-universe. For example, the language spoken by most characters in the Star Wars films would be called , not . All in-universe content must be written in the historical past tense with a third-person perspective. This is because Star Wars is set "a long time ago," as stated in the beginning of each film. Some users have created stories that take place on . These articles must still be written from an in-universe perspective. Even if a travels forward in time and reaches in , "English" would still be referred to as "Galactic Basic Standard" in the interest of uniformity and proper perspective. If the Earth storyline, or any other storyline for that matter, takes place in our own future, they must still be written in the historical past tense. Although the in-universe perspective is required for all such articles, an out-of-universe perspective is to be used for an in-universe article's "Behind the scenes" section. This is because the behind the scenes section documents real-world information about the development of an article or storyline, as well as other out-of-universe facts relevant to the topic of the article. The "behind the scenes" section is the only section of an in-universe article where an out-of-universe perspective is permitted. Out-of-universe "Out-of-universe" is the opposite of in-universe, as out-of-universe applies to material that belongs to the real world as opposed to the in-universe world, meaning it is written with a real-life perspective. Such material includes, but is not limited to, actors, authors, directors, producers, franchises, series’, books, and other articles and materials that would acknowledge a subject is fictional. An example of an out-of-universe article would be Star Wars: The Drewton Legacy, which details information about a real-world photonovel as opposed to an in-universe character or event. Out-of-universe articles use both present and past tense. For an article's synopsis of a fan film, fan fiction piece, or other such fan works, present tense would be used, treating the story as if it was currently ongoing. For example, a synopsis would say "Queen Amidala arrives on Coruscant, hoping that the Galactic Senate will hear her plea for help and lend assistance in dealing with the Trade Federation," as opposed to "Queen Amidala arrived on Coruscant, hoping that the Galactic Senate would hear her plea for help and lend assistance in dealing with the Trade Federation." Information about a work's development, namely the history of how that work came to be, would be written in the past tense. Point of view All articles are to be written with a neutral point of view (NPOV), meaning that views, facts, and other relevant types of information about the subject are represented fairly and without bias. This includes both in-universe and out-of-universe articles, as well as article templates and categories. This is an important principle when attempting to maintain an encyclopedic atmosphere. The easiest way to know whether something requires a neutral point of view is to determine whether the piece of information in question could have multiple opinions, both in and out-of-universe, that need to be presented, but not asserted, fairly. All significant points of view are presented as opposed to simply the most popular one, and the most popular view or an intermediate view should not be asserted to be correct. This does not, however, mean that the article cannot inform the reader which view was more popular in-universe (or out-of-universe, depending on the context). It simply means that the article should not assert that the most popular one is the correct one. Readers should be left to form their own opinions. An example that is often cited is in regards to . Most audience members who see the Star Wars films agree that Palpatine is an evil person. A small minority, however, does not. In-universe, not everyone sees Palpatine as evil either. Light-sided characters likely would, but dark-sided characters likely would not. Therefore, an objective encyclopedic article would not be able to state that Palpatine was evil as if such information was fact. Users should also try to avoid using , which some people will often use thinking that it avoids a non-neutral point of view. According to Wikipedia, weasel words are "words and phrases that, whilst communicating a vague or ambiguous claim, create an impression that something specific and meaningful has been said." An example of this would be saying that "some people believed that Palpatine was evil." This still leaves readers with a generalization, as it is unknown who “some people” are and why they believed it. See for more information about how to avoid weasel words. It is important to note that a neutral point of view is still a point of view, simply one that does not agree or disagree with a particular claim, fact, or other relevant piece of information. Because of this, a neutral point of view should not be confused with a total lack of or elimination of point of view. Headings "Heading" refers to the sections found within an article. They are created using the equal sign in order to generate larger names with either a solid gray line or simply large black letters, depending on the amount of equal signs used. To make a heading, use the code (the number of equal signs may vary depending on the specific section) rather than the bold markup. For example: : This is a heading The aforementioned code produces: :This is a heading If headings are marked in that way, a table of contents will automatically be generated from all of the headings in the article depending on the amount of headings that are provided. Sections will be automatically numbered in the table of contents for users with that preference set, and words within properly marked headings will be given greater weight in searches. Headings also help readers by breaking up the text and outlining the article in an organized fashion. Only the first letter of the first word of a heading title and proper nouns in a heading are to be capitalized, with all other letters remaining lower case. Furthermore, links are not to be used in headings, unless users are linking to years within parentheses. Overuse of sub-headings should also be avoided. Spelling While we acknowledge that the readers and editors of this wiki speak many varieties of the English language, this wiki mandates standard spelling, grammar, punctuation, and word usage. The reason for this is not bias towards an American standard, but rather because this is the variety of English used in the first printings of most canon primary sources. If a word has two acceptable variants in American English, the one that is considered "more American" is to be used. An example of this is the spelling of "judgement" as "judgment." The only exception to this rule is the spelling of words ending in "-ogue;" while "dialog" is an acceptable version of "dialogue," the latter is preferred. If the title of an article differs in different varieties of English, the American title should be the article title, with alternate names being used as redirects (for example, Lightsabre redirects to Lightsaber). Should users be using fan sources for their articles and the fan source uses a different variety of English, it must not be converted into American English simply for the sake of the article. To use a canon example, is not renamed "The Traveling Jindas" simply because of Wookieepedia's article guidelines. Also, if a direct quote from a British source has a word which is spelled differently in American English, the original British spelling must be used as that is the primary source. A sic sign may be put after it, but it is not required. It is certainly the hope of the users of this wiki that all who want to contribute here have the opportunity to do so, but at the same time we must make it clear that this is the English Star Wars Fanon Wiki. If English is not your primary language and/or you have trouble speaking the English language, has a number of other ''Star Wars'' fanon wikis in multiple languages. If Wikia does not currently have a Star Wars fanon wiki in your language, you could consider creating one. Capital letters Galaxy, sector, and system When the Star Wars galaxy is linked to, it is not to be capitalized. Similarly, when users name systems and sectors, and when they link to them, the words "system" and "sector" should remain in lower case, unless canon or a fan source indicates otherwise. For example, canon maintains the Corporate Sector as opposed to "Corporate sector." Examples of proper capitalization include Corellian sector and Corellian system. Jedi and Sith The words "Jedi" and "Sith" must always be capitalized. "Jedi" and "Sith" are metonymies that refer to "a member of the Jedi Order" and "a member of the Sith Order," respectively. Furthermore, both "Jedi" and "Sith" are also plural nouns, as opposed to "Jedis" and "Siths." The Force While "the Force" is a proper noun and therefore must be capitalized, the light and dark sides of the Force are not capitalized in the vast majority of official sources. Therefore, they must not be capitalized. For example: "Anakin Skywalker fell to the dark side," not "...to the Dark Side." Please note that this does not apply if "force" refers to any other meanings of the word. An example of this is "A strike force of stormtroopers entered the system," not "A strike Force..." Rebel and Imperial If the adjectives "Rebel" and "Imperial" refer to the Rebel Alliance or the Galactic Empire, respectively, they should always be capitalized. For example, "Mon Calamari supported the Rebel cause" and "The Imperial base on Kejim was..." However, please note that if the referents of these forms are not either of these organizations, there is no reason to capitalize. For example, "The galaxy was in turmoil by a series of rebellions and civil wars" would not have "rebellions" capitalized. Human and other sentient species In all sections of in-universe articles, the words "Human" and "Near-Human" should be capitalized, just as the name of any other sentient species (Twi'lek, Rodian, Wookiee, etc.) in the Star Wars universe would be. The word "humanoid," however, should not be capitalized. Please note that semi-sentient and non-sentient creature names must not be capitalized unless dictated otherwise by a source. Therefore, writing "Rancor" instead of "rancor" is not grammatically correct. Ranks and titles A rank's name is not to be capitalized if it refers to the rank, not a person. For example, "Ackbar was a well-known admiral" or "As a captain, he had many responsibilities." However, if the word refers to a person, it should be in capitals. For example, "As an experienced leader, Admiral Ackbar..." There are some ranks whose names should always be capitalized, regardless of usage. These titles include, but are not limited to, Padawan, Vice Admiral, and Flight Leader. Italics and miscellaneous grammar Class and ship names Names of specific spaceships should be capitalized, italicized, and referred to by neutral pronouns (it, its). For example, "The Chimaera was a Star Destroyer. Its commanding officer was Captain Pellaeon." The use of the definite article should follow the most common use for the ship or class. Class names are italicized only when a spaceship in the class bears the same name. The definite article may be used, but it is not required. When a ship's class is a modifier, a hyphen should be used ("Quasar Fire-class bulk cruiser"). When it is a noun, however, a hyphen should not be used ("Ships of the Victory class were often overlooked"). Do not italicize a class name when using the class name and type without "-class" ("Venator Star Destroyer"), or when it is being used alone as a noun ("Most models of the Broadside were lightly armored and ran with a small crew."). Furthermore, craft types such as starfighters, missiles, and others where a specific spaceship does not bear the class name should be capitalized, un-italicized, preceded by the full technical designation in the first instance, and it may be referred to solely by type name or common name in all succeeding instances. Additionally, it should also be referred to with a neutral pronoun. These requirements can be waived for specific instances if contradicted by a fan or canon source. Apostrophes and possessives ending in "s" While plural nouns ending in "s" should be made possessive by adding only an apostrophe, singular nouns ending in "s" can be made possessive by adding either an apostrophe followed by another "s" or simply an apostrophe, provided that each article is consistent throughout. Users are encouraged, but not required, to use only an s' for possessive nouns ending in a Z-sound. For example, while discussing the armor of multiple s, one would write "Mandalorians' armor." While discussing the armor of , however, one could write "Nihilus's armor" or "Nihilus' armor" depending on their preference. Proper use of the dash code Many users on this wiki incorrectly use hyphens instead of the dash codes (– and —), generally because they do not know how to properly use them. To use the correct article formatting, dashes should be used instead of hyphens, such as in the examples that follow. For the first example, dates should use the more proper "en dash" code, which is the former of the two aforementioned dash codes (–). If one or both of the dates have a “c.” (for “circa”) in front of them, then the dash should be surrounded by spaces. :Example: incorrect: "(19 BBY - 19 ABY)" correct: "(19 BBY–19 ABY)" :Example: incorrect: "(20 BBY - c. 20 ABY)" correct: "(20 BBY – c. 20 ABY)" When one end of the range of dates/numbers is missing, meaning that one of the numbers/dates is unknown, the "em dash" code (—) needs to be used. :Example: incorrect: "(19 BBY - ?)" correct: "(19 BBY—)" :Example: incorrect: "(? - c. 20 ABY)" correct: "(—c. 20 ABY)" Within paragraphs, you should never use one hyphen (' - ') or two hyphens (' -- ') in the place of a dash. The proper way to make a dash in a normal sentence is to use an "em dash" code that is not surrounded by spaces. :Example: incorrect: "Star Wars is - as everyone knows - amazing." correct: "Star Wars is—as everyone knows—amazing." :Example: incorrect: "Star Wars is--as everyone knows--amazing." correct: "Star Wars is—as everyone knows—amazing." None of this is to say that hyphens can never be used. Sometimes certain words, such as "re-evaluate," require them or else they will look improper ("re-evaluate" vs. "reevaluate"). You can also use it when joining two words together that serve as a single adjective of a noun in subject (but not when in predicate). You can also use them in prefixes and suffixes (such as "re-review") and in compound numbers. Typing dashes may seem complicated, but more often than not they tend to be fairly simple. The easiest way to do this is to type – to create the "en dash" code and — to create the "em dash" code. Additional methods and advice for typing dashes can be found here. Units of measurement All in-universe articles are to use metric units of weight, mass, length, and other relevant measurements. This is in conjunction with most sources of official Star Wars canon. A list of measurement units can be found . Quotations Quotations help to liven up a page, using dialogue from characters to help "set the scene" of a section, so to speak. Quotations are created through the use of quotation templates, which can be found here, and should only be used at the beginning of an article and at the beginning of each section. An overuse of quotes can make an article look very sloppy. This is particularly enforced on good articles and featured articles. Quotes that serve as introductions to article subsections should not contain internal links because they appear unprofessional and are generally distracting. The only exception to this rule would be in-universe words or phrases of an obscure nature, though even those are strongly discouraged. Furthermore, quotes are not narrative prose that is not actual spoken dialogue or a character's personal memoirs, journal, or diary. This means that thoughts are not considered quotable material. Categorization In regards to categorization, users must keep in mind the following: #All articles are required to be properly categorized with as many relevant categories as possible. #"Images by" categories may only contain user-made or significantly user-modified images. Just because you uploaded an image does not mean you get to claim it as "your" image. #User-based categories, excluding “Articles by” and "Fan fiction by," are not allowed. #*These aforementioned allowable user-based categories must be hidden using . Fan fiction categorization is dictated in the "Fan fiction" section below. Further information about categorization can be found in the categorization tutorial. Fan fiction Narratives Fan fiction narratives, such as chapters, parts, and/or complete stories, need to be in a subpage instead of the article namespace. This is because anything in the article namespace falls under the rules of this Manual of Style, and the narratives themselves are incompatible with these guidelines. When naming subpages to contain a narrative or narrative segment, use the original article for the overall work as the parent page. For example, Force Exile IV: Guardian has a number of segments, such as Force Exile IV: Guardian/Part 1, in subpages of the corresponding article. The parent article (in this case, Force Exile IV: Guardian) falls under the out-of-universe layout guide as specified in the "Layout guide" section of this policy, but the subpages do not. This policy does not apply to chapters, parts, and/or complete stories uploaded as .PDF files. This section, as well as the following section, also applies to all other applicable fan works. Categorization Fan fiction segments, as defined above, are required to be placed into Category:Fanwork segments or their own story-specific chapter category, an example being Category:Chapters of The Seventh Star. This is to ensure ease of organization and navigation in finding chapters. Furthermore, it should be noted that novels, novellas, and short stories are required to be at least 40,000, 7,500, and 1,000 words long, respectively, in narrative content in order for their articles, as distinguished from narrative segments above, to be categorized as such. Manual of Style help Following these guidelines may seem like a daunting task for users who are new to wikis and the encyclopedic format. We understand that, and it is perfectly normal that some people may be confused. To ease this confusion, the community is more than willing to help anyone who needs it and asks for it. That last point, asking for it, is very important, because we have no way of knowing if you want help unless you seek it. Our wiki has a Writing Center designed to help users with their articles, and virtually all users on the wiki are happy to help out anyone who asks for it. Never be afraid to seek help from anyone and everyone with your articles here! See also * Content policy * Copyrights * Deletion policy * Editing policy * Equality policy * Layout Guide